20 Delhi schools tap sun to cut power bill to near-zero

There are lessons to be learnt from these 20 Delhi government schools. In reducing their monthly power bill to near-zero by installing solar panels on rooftops, the schools are showing the way in achieving self-sufficiency in electricity production. Shradha Chettri | TNN | June 20, 2019, 08:17 IST

Between September and December 2017, these institutes — scattered across the city — installed solar panels with the capacity in the range of 20 kW to 59 kW. Sarvodaya Kanya Vidyalaya, Andrews Ganj, is one such school where the power bill has been zero for the last three months. Panch Deo Kumar, estate manager of the school that has close to 800 students on its rolls, said: “Our monthly power bill used to be around Rs 40,000. In the last three months, we have no dues.”

The school has installed 99 panels and these help it run fans, water coolers and motors, among other appliances. The panels were set up at a cost of Rs 20 lakh. “With the old fans being replaced with new ones as a part of the renovation process, the load has come down considerably. On Sundays, the surplus power is sent back to the discom’s grid,” Kumar said.

In many other schools, while the power bill might not have come down to an absolute zero, the savings are massive. Hemant Sharma, principal of Sarvodaya Kanya Vidyalaya, Timarpur, said: “We used to run up a monthly power bill of around Rs 30,000. This has now come down to almost Rs 8,000. We hope bring it down to zero soon.” The school has 1,800 children. In another school, which has solar panels of the highest capacity at 59 kW, the monthly bill has been lowered by nearly Rs 2 lakh. The school building also houses the offices of the district education officer and an SSA centre.

The installation of solar panels has been completed in another 60 schools whereas the tendering process is under way in 40 others. The government is targeting 500 schools under this project.

Pujarini Sen, a campaigner at Greenpeace India, said the time was ripe for the government to push solar energy. “A number of private schools in Delhi have already shifted to solar energy. The savings from these can be immense. Government schools, meanwhile, had immense solar rooftop potential that was going unused till now,” Sen said.